Nelson Peltz Pulling Out of Disney Proxy Fight?

Over on Puck News, we're getting word that Nelson Peltz might be ready to give up on Disney and the proxy fight. But is that true?

While you have heard many times from me that I don't believe Peltz will win seats on the board for 2024, I also suspect that this only builds pressure in the cooker so that he may win far more in 2025. That's because Disney has taken an "everything and the kitchen sink" approach to winning over investors. I'm not here to give you financial advise (and this post is not such advise), but my speculation is that Disney simply can't sustain this strategy over years. Cancelling Disney+ shows and moving others into theatrical releases is a magic trick that will get old with investors over time. 

All of that said, here's the quote from Puck that I think you should see. For ethical reasons, we don't post large text quotes from sources behind a paywall, but I think this is a fair snippet:

"Speaking of selling… Nelson Peltz sold some 7.3 percent of his fund’s stake in Disney during the fourth quarter. Trian now owns 6.77 million Disney shares, worth $755 million these days, down from 7.3 million shares at the end of the third quarter of 2023. (He also continues to have voting control over Ike Perlmutter’s 25.5 million Disney shares.) Why would Peltz sell down his stake in Disney in the middle of a high-profile proxy fight with the company, when he’s trying to get board seats for himself and former Disney C.F.O. Jay Rasulo? Beats me. But it’s not a good look, that’s for sure."

https://puck.news/buffetts-big-short/

I've already spoken with Valliant Renegade and Jonas J. Campbell this morning and we've looked into additional sources for what is actually going on here. I don't want to get ahead of our skis, but I think it's fair to say that we're not ready to say Nelson Peltz is fleeing the Disney situation. Valliant is planning to release information on this very soon via his YouTube Channel. We've decided he should have the lead on it. 

What I would say, however, is that Disney is sweating bullets hoping they can hold off Peltz and that the 81-year-old will give up after this next vote. The reason is simple. The tricks can't carry this company for much longer. You can't continue to announce future endeavors that aren't certain and have Wall Street play along forever. For now that has worked because the institutional investors are politically aligned with looking the other way for Disney. Remember what we've talked about -- this is the battle of the elites for the future of the culture war. The X-Men reboot... it's all about revision of your favorite franchise again, market be damned. And that's because there's incentive to win the culture war which is a play for oligarchical corporatism. So when major investors won't sell Disney stock even as Disney+ subscribers are poor, even as the box office is in shambles, it's all because this is a battle of Wall Street versus Main Street. Main Street has abandoned Disney.

Even the mainstream admits that Disney is dangling the future in front of investors with no guarantee of success: https://www.cnbc.com/2024/02/07/disney-q1-earnings-nelson-peltz-isnt-abandoning-proxy-fight.html

However, to conclude, Elon Musk didn't just show up with Nelson Peltz for fun. And the idea that this is cooling down or that Peltz is fleeing strikes me as unlikely. If there's anything I know about 2024, it's that I expect things to escalate across a number of domains, not calm down.

More info coming on Valliant Renegade later today or tomorrow. Thank you to Vash Sky for help investigating this topic.